[Reader-list] Call for Articles: InfoChange Agenda issue on 'Access to Justice in India'

[Rajendra Bhat Uppinangadi]

Oshik jee, good initiative indeed, where chief justice after retirement is
sure to be posted as Chairman of human rights commission, retired
buraeucrats sure to get posted in various commissions and panels, be it
Company law Board, judicial reforms, police reforms etc, as long as these
individuals are loyal to the party ruling and not to the civil society.!
A supreme court judge in one of the hearing commented that civil servants
after retirements are in Company law boards, he is forgetting that most of
the judges after retirement are on the pay rol;ls of various commissions,
report pending for years for submission.!
regards,
rajen.

On Thu, May 13, 2010 at 4:27 PM, OISHIK SIRCAR <oishiksircar at gmail.com>wrote:

> Hello:
>
> As guest-editor of a forthcoming issue of *InfoChange Agenda* themed
> 'Access
> to Justice in India', I am writing to invite contributions to the issue.
>
> *InfoChange Agenda *has been conceived as a quarterly dossier that informs
> civil society on crucial issues of sustainable development and social
> justice, diversity and pluralism issues that are being pushed into the
> margins. It is designed to enable concerned citizens in India/ South Asia
> to
> marshal salient information, facts, figures, perspectives and reportage, so
> that they can clarify their ideas and participate in drawing up their own
> agenda for a more equitable and sustainable world. You can find more
> information on *InfoChange Agenda* and access the previous issues at
> www.infochangeindia.org
>
> The innovation of the marvel called ‘Public Interest Litigation’ (PIL) in
> the 1980s revolutionized the idea of ‘access to justice’ in India. It
> marked
> a moment in India’s judicial history that recognized the ways in which
> marginality adversely impacts on people’s ability to make use of the law to
> safeguard their rights. In the last two decades, how has the idea of PILs
> generally, and access to justice specifically undergone a transformation,
> in
> the face of an India that opened up to Liberalization, Privatization and
> Globalization from 1991 onwards? Have we been able to build on the
> innovation, or has it been abused/ subverted in the name of facilitating
> the
> poor and disadvantaged to more effectively engage with the law? Has the
> liberalization of the economy broadened the gap between the marginalized
> and
> the law? This issue of *InfoChange Agenda* will attempt to provide a
> background to the development of PILs and legal aid in India since the 1980
> and then trace the contours of its development post liberalization. It will
> document the various strategies that human rights groups, lawyers and
> people’s movements have employed to use this tool to address rights
> concerns
> across a whole gamut of issues from prisoner’s rights to the environment.
> It
> will also address the rise of bodies like Khap Panchayat’s as perverse
> forms
> of extra-constitutional adjudication mechanisms that have received both
> societal and state sanction.  Finally, the volume will address the question
> of the futures of access to justice in India looking at innovations beyond
> the PIL like fast-tract to virtual courts, arbitration, jan sunwais, lok
> adalats, the RTI and the recent Gram Nyayalay Act.
>
> Indicative themes are as follows:
>
> 1.                 1. *Public Interest or Private Interest? PILs today*
>
>   1. *Poverty and Access to Justice: Legal Aid in India*
>   2. *Should “Terrorists” be defended?*
>   3. *Marketing Justice: The Privatisation of Human Rights*
>   4. *Access Denied: Law and Marginality*
>   5. *Righting Wrongs: Access to Justice and RTI*
>   6. *The Tragedy of Criminal Justice Reforms*
>   7. *Whither Judicial Activism? The Crisis in the Courts*
>   8. *NHRC: All Bark, No Bite?*
>   9. *30 million and counting: How do we climb the mountain of backlogs?
>   Innovations in enhancing Access to Justice*
>   10. *Death Penalty: Suffocating Access to Justice*
>   11. *The Supreme Court’s ‘Conservative Turn’: Supporting the Market,
>   Disadvantaging People*
>   12. *Tort Law: Is Compensation good enough remedy?*
>   13. *Litigating the Environment*
>   14. *Post-conflict Justice: Peace, without Rights?*
>   15. *SMS Justice: The Use of New Media*
>   16. *Good Governance: A panacea to inacess?*
>   17. *Indigenous Justice: Primitive or Progressive?*
>   18. *Strategy Talk: How to use access legislations like the NREGA or DV
>   Act?*
>   19. *How to file a PIL: an ordinary person’s guide*
>
> The themes are not limited to these. You are welcome to write on anything
> else that is connected with the broader theme of 'Access to Justice in
> India'.
>
> Since *InfoChange Agenda* is not an academic journal, I request you to use
> minimal footnoting and make the pieces journalistic or feature-like. Please
> try and stick to a word limit of 2000-3000. The Centre for Communication
> and
> Development Studies (CCDS) that publishes the journal will be happy to pay
> an honorarium of Rs. 2000 for selected contributions.
>
> Please note the following timeline --
>
> *Abstract Submission Deadline: June 30, 2010
> Announcement of accepted abstracts: July 30, 2010
> Article Submission Deadline: October 30, 2010
> Tentative date for publication: February 2011.*
>
> Email your submissions to oishiksircar at gmail.com with 'Agenda: Access to
> Justice' in the subject line.  For any clarifications, please feel free to
> write to me.
>
> Warmly,
>
> Oishik Sircar
>
>
>
> --
> OISHIK SIRCAR
>
> oishiksircar at gmail.com
> oishik.sircar at utoronto.ca
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-- 
Rajen.